Posted on 06/18/2007 4:15:29 AM PDT by Kaslin
We know about Mike Nifong, and it looks like he's going to get his comeuppance. Yet the question remains: Why would a seasoned prosecutor like Nifong flout the rules in so many ways in the Duke case? Why would he publicly describe the Duke lacrosse players as "rapists" before that had been established in a court of law? Why would he suppress DNA evidence that the defense was entitled to see? Why, in short, did he go so far before the facts were in?
One of Nifong's public comments provides a clue. He says he wanted to protect the town of Durham from the reputation of being a place featuring "a bunch of lacrosse players from Duke raping a black girl." From this we see that Nifong suffers from delusions of grandeur. He sees himself as the Custodian of Durham's Reputation. He views his job as the White Protector of the Black Race. If he simply saw himself as a prosecutor doing his job in a difficult situation--with competing claims and counterclaims--he wouldn't have made such an ass of himself.
Nifong seems to be suffering from Recovering Southerner Syndrome. This is the ailment, first named on this blog, in which Southerners feel so guilty about slavery and segregation that they perform undignified backward somersaults to prove that they are "not really Southern." When they encounter something Southern--like white Southern frat boys at a party--their mind immediately conjures up images of segregated water fountains and they draw their swords and go into Crusader Against Racism mode. Viewed in this way, Nifong saw himself as a kind of white knight slaying the dragons of Southern bigotry. Nifong was not alone in this: dozens of Duke professors reacted to the incident in exactly the same way.
The only problem was that the facts didn't bear them out. The Duke players apparently weren't planning a rape or a lynching; they were merely misbehaving in the manner of "boys gone wild." That’s not how gentlemen are supposed to behave, but it isn’t discriminatory and it isn’t illegal. So the presumption of white bigotry was entirely wrong in this case. The world is different now and the old civil rights models don't necessarily apply. I suspect that MIke Nifong is not the only fellow who is going to learn this lesson the hard way.
So Nifong is going to resign, and maybe get his license taken away too. Now what about the mau-mau artists at Duke, influential figures on the faculty, who whipped the campus up into a racial hysteria? What happens to the people who helped to create a mob mentality against students, rendering their lives miserable for more than a year, when their guilt was never established, never even probable, and now they have been shown to be innocent?
From the time the first reports of sexual assault at Duke University surfaced, these intellectual vigilantes went to work. Houston Baker, a professor of English and Afro-American Studies, issued a public letter condemning the "abhorrent sexual assault, verbal racial violence and drunken white male privilege loosed among us." He seems to have simply presumed the students guilty.
Shortly after that, 88 members of the Duke arts and science faculty--the so-called Gang of 88--signed a public statement praising campus demonstrators who had distributed a "WANTED" poster that branded the lacrosse players as "rapists." The Gang of 88 didn't use that term, but its statement referred to "what happened to this young woman." Ignoring calls to wait for the evidence, the gang instead went into full social-justice gear.
"What is apparent every day now is the anger and fear of many students who know themselves to be objects of racism and sexism, who see illuminated in this moment's extraordinary spotlight what they live with every day...We're turning up the volume in a moment when some of the most vulnerable among us are being asked to quiet down while we wait. To the students speaking individually and to the protesters making collective noise, thank you for not waiting and for making yourselves heard." In other words, Go vigilantes go!
Now it is time to hold these folks accountable. I know it’s too much to expect that these politically correct vigilantes have their teaching licenses taken away. But perhaps it’s not too much to ask that they be officially reprimanded by the university.
The Gang of 88 doesn’t have enough class or ethics to even apologize.
Check out their latest, signed by 87
www.concerneddukefaculty.org
Duke U. may still get it’s just reward for keeping the Gang of 88. If you think about it, why would any whites want to go there if they are going to be discriminated against?
Hate Speech
Racial Discrimination
Sexual Discrimination
The Duke Lacrosse team has every reason to bring charges against the ‘gang of 88’ based on the team’s playing privileges were infringed upon, hostile environment the teacher created, etc. There are very real and present violations that the teachers are guilty of committing.
Masochism
Because they are raised to feel guilty, and lack racial solidarity.
I believe the only way to hold thiss gang of 88 accountable is to sue the living daylights out of Duke!
What they did is reprehensible, but not civilly liable. Although there was a huge thread on this topic yesterday, and I came away from it thinking they would be held accountable by a civil action, I now doubt it.
Duke U. may still get it’s just reward for keeping the Gang of 88. If you think about it, why would any whites want to go there if they are going to be discriminated against?It's very hard to get rid of professors with tenure.
Make them go to sensitivity classes run by Newt Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh.
How about 3 defamation lawsuits against the 88 Gang and their employer?
for agreeing with other students views? No way! It would be a waste of time to go after them, but not Duke.
Not only the 88, Duke, Nifong, the DA’s office, the lab that went along with Nifong to not state DNA evidence that showed their innocence.
It’s my understanding the Lacrosse coach already settled with Duke for a nice retirement check.
Yes, way.
They created a hostile environment against innocent people.
If they would have done what they did in a regular workplace they would have been dismissed, reprimanded, brought up for suit, or sat down with the EEOC.
The University had an absolute fiduciary responsibility to protect its students to the extent possible. The fact that the admin of the school allowed anybody to print up wanted posters with images and names of the lax players and invited the "new black panther" party on camput, presumably to hunt them down like dogs, cannot rationally be construed as honoring that responsibility. They created a physically dangerous situation for all of those athletes, which is certainly actionable.
The investigation of the “rape” should continue. Crystal Gail Mangum said that she was raped, and she had the DNA of several men on and in her body. Fortunately for the defendants, their DNA did not match that of the samples collected.
But the Durham PD and the States Attorney General still have the DNA profiles. It would be very illuminating to find out who these men are. Did they rape Mangum? Did they pay her for sex? Or did they help her to stage the incident so she could eventually sue?
As for the Group, of 88, the three vindicated Duke Lacrosse team manbers should DEMAND a public apology. If they do not receive one, they should hit them with a lawsuit that will leave the Group of 88 barefoot for life.
Jackson was pretty tame actually. I think he knew she was lying. He offered her a scholarship, but he stayed away for the most part.
As a side note, during on of the hearings against the Lacrosse players early in the sham-investigation, Nifong sat in the court and listened to a black panther made death threats against Reede Seligmann. It only stopped when the judge came in and took control over the court.
I was suprised the ethics board did not charge Nifong with derelection of duty. As the DA it was his responsibility to enforce the laws. He did nothing but smirk as death threats and other threats of violence were bandied about the court room.
Everyone should read at their pathetic attempt to sugar coat what they did ....and it's actually a great example of Revisionist History.
Absent from the whole "clarification" aka new statement by this academic lefties is any APOLOGY to those falsely accused, and admonishment of LIARS and FRAUDS they supported and even a weak attempt to admit that INNOCENT before PROVEN GUILTY is our Justice System.
sickening
I hope there is some legal action that can be taken against them.
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